Only Fools Are Satisfied
by sparklylulz
Summary: She wishes she could embrace him, and tell him that she's never going to forget him. She wishes she could see him smile a real smile for one last time, but mostly she wishes she could tell him that she does love him. -Gale/Katniss. Post Mockingjay.


**I don't know why after seeing The Hunger Games I now only want to write Gale and Katniss angst?**

**Hunger Games and the title are not mine.**

–

_Only Fools Are Satisfied_

Peeta and Katniss do grow together. At first it's only a few days of being alone together for a few hours, but days string along to form months, and months spiral into years. She spends most of their time trying to remember what normal life was, but it's not like she ever had a normal life even before the Games. Peeta's memories start to clear and suddenly there's too much talk of children and the future.

When she looks at Peeta and imagines their child all she can see is Prim. Her little blond braids and stunning blue eyes and even if it's been years and years since the day, she can still see her body laying charred and lifeless on the ground.

Their fights are almost always about children. Peeta's wanted them since the day he was old enough to realize where they came from, and he's always wanted them with Katniss. She hates that she can't, can't, _can't_ give him what he wants.

From the moment he handed her the loaf of bread that sparked everything, she's only wanted him to have everything. Peeta's big heart was the best and worst thing about him, and she spends her nights next to him, wondering if Haymitch was right. She will never, ever deserve the boy with the bread.

There comes a point where they don't speak for a week. Katniss has changed in many ways, but her stubborn streak will never falter. Peeta lets her be. Haymitch calls them idiots and takes another swig from his bottle.

"Katniss, this has to end." Peeta's words come from somewhere in the dark of the kitchen. She should have known he'd be making bread._Stupid mistakes, _she thinks.

She's not any better at expressing herself, but she glances up at him quickly and sees exactly what she expects. His big eyes are pleading and she sighs, sagging into the counter.

"I don't have anything left to say," she breathes softly. "I know that you thought we could have _things_ we wouldn't have had, but I can remember sitting in the grass next to Gale and telling him why I couldn't ever have..." She chokes on the word ' _children_ ' and instead turns her own eyes on him, pleading him to understand that she can't keep fighting over this.

"Is that what this is about? Do you," he breaks off, looking out their tiny kitchen window, "Do you wish it was him? Gale?"

She thinks he's incredibly brave for being able to say Gale's name. It took her two years to talk about him in any capacity.

"No! No, Peeta." She breathes quietly, "There are days where I do miss him, and sometimes I wish I could just go ask him things I can't ask you." It's about two seconds before she realizes how bad she sounds, but Peeta wouldn't be Peeta if he didn't nod in understanding.

"Have you," he pauses to suck in a breath quickly. "Have you thought about going to see him? In District Two?"

Has she thought about it? Every day since their lives settled down. Every day since she stopped blaming him for Prim's death. Every day since Peeta started asking for a child, and every day she watches Peeta's hands twist into knots, like they remember the feeling of her throat and long to be there again.

Instead of saying so many words, (she's never been able to say many words), she just nods slightly. He sucks in a breath and she curses herself again for hurting him. All she ever did was hurt him.

Some nights, when her dreams aren't revolving around Prim or Snow or Coin, she dreams of dying in the Hunger Games. Dying by Cato's sword, or Clove's knife, or even dehydration. Some nights she thinks that maybe that would have been better for everyone; Prim and her mother would have been safe, Peeta would have been safe, Gale wouldn't feel like a murderer. Finnick and Annie could have been happy. She shakes herself out of those thoughts quickly because they all made their choices, as had she, for the greater good.

"I want you to go." Peeta says after a few moments of silently watching her face. "Just... just come back to me, all right?"

She does cry then. She cries more now than she ever had since her father died. She sobs into him for hours because she will never deserve him. He knows what she means with her tears. He holds her tightly – the Mockingjay, the Girl on Fire – but he knows all she's ever really been is just another broken girl from District 12 who should have gotten much more than she ever did.

His hands knot in her loose hair, and smelling the autumn on her skin, he kisses her tenderly. So softly she's reminded of being sixteen and not knowing what love was in a dark, wet cave. His fingers set the edges of her body on fire with something she can't always contain, but she doesn't move.

Peeta is just as damaged as her, and she wonders why she can't hate him for dealing with it better than she probably ever will.

They lay against each other, bare skin mingling together, causing them to become one. He snores softly next to her, but she can't sleep, her small hand lain across her abdomen.

The next morning she boards a long train carrying coal and other goods, watching Peeta's soft face from the window. Her hand print lingers on the foggy window miles after she loses sight of him.

–

District 2 is nice after the rebuilding period, not as grand as it had been before, but the architecture and masonry shine bright in the early light of morning. She still only remembers fire and rubble and terrified screams. It's a few moments before she feels like breathing again. Her lungs aren't accustomed to the cool autumn air of the district.

Unloading is quick, she didn't bring anything other than the clothes on her back and a light backpack filled with necessities and money and a jacket. She's not sure how to go about finding a Hawthorne in the middle of District Two, but she's fairly certain he'll stick out like a sore thumb in this place filled with rigid suits.

She buys a bottle of fresh water from a boy in the wide sprawling market, his eyes the exact same shade of blue that made her heart ache. She drinks it all too fast, trying to drown the memories from resurfacing.

It's warm enough out that she doesn't need her jacket by midday, and wondering through the district serves to calm her nerves. She briefly pauses to think about what Peeta is doing – probably baking – and she wishes he were here.

It's easy enough to find where the neighborhoods have been rebuilt on the outskirts of the town, all little stone and brick houses, nicer than District 12, exuding a cool and unfeeling nature. She presses her palm to the golden letters that spell out 'GALE HAWTHORNE – CONTRACTOR'. She smiles a little that he got to have his name in gold. He'd probably hated that, then again she hasn't know him for nearly ten years. It was a staggering and sobering fact that people change.

She raises her knuckles to rap on the thick wooden door, suddenly feeling like the 13-year-old being taught to properly hunt for the first time. She brings her fist down in a quick movement and hears a scuffle of chair on floor.

When the door pulls back, her head is held evenly, eyes latching straight onto the familiar light gray shade from her youth. Gale is tall as ever, still muscular and tough, but his face shows lines from stress and his thick, dark hair might have a few grays speckled throughout. He doesn't say anything, just stares at her in blank confusion.

"I shouldn't have come." She breathes quickly, "This was stupid." Her feet turn to leave but the gentle caress of calloused hands on her upper arm keeps her from moving.

There's a small smile on Gale's lips, sad and happy and maybe a little nostalgic, too. He takes in her face, so much older and thinner than he remembers, her soft dress in a delicate shade of green.

"Hey, Catnip." The nickname causes her to flinch slightly, another wave of bad memories threaten to sweep her up, but she focuses on his long fingers and forces a small smile. "Long time, huh?" _Sometimes,_ she thinks, _people don't change._

"Come in." He says quietly, forever understanding that she doesn't know how to voice her emotions.

His home is not as cool and unfeeling as the outside. There's a small fire lit in the corner of the living room, and a handsome wooden desk facing the view out the window into a small wooded area. There aren't many pictures covering the paneled walls – just some of his brothers, his mother, and – she turns away from the familiar picture of herself. It's from the first Games, her familiar braid fixed perfectly thanks to Cinna's hands, no smile lining her face.

"I knew you'd come back." He says quietly, eyes resting on the framed image.

"I know," she whispers. "You told me so. I didn't believe you."

It's an uncomfortable silence which follows, his dark eyes not leaving her face, like he's trying to put every detail of her in his memory. She notices with an aching sadness there are no signs of a wife or girlfriend or children littering his home. She thinks back to hers, with Peeta's socks on the couch and his baking utensils on the counters. Loneliness hits her in the chest.

"Why are you here, Catnip?" He asks finally, sitting down across from her, expression steady as ever.

She sighs softly, "I don't know. I just wanted to tell you..." She looks up at the rock ceiling, forcing any tears back into her eyes. "I'm sorry I blamed you for... _thing_s." She can't force Prim's name out, not now. His head hangs in guilt because he hears her name echoing all around him.

"You were right to blame me." He says evenly and there's a sudden, irrational part of her that wants to hit him. Her temper has never been particularly controllable, but as she looks at this shadow of a man she used to know, she feels like the Mockingjay again.

Her eyes flash, "No! I wasn't!" She tries to even her breathing but when she hears chuckles coming from the man opposite of her, the fire in her chest just intensifies.

Gales laughter is tinged with only the slightest amount of sadness, "Stubborn as ever, Katniss." He shoots her a very small smile, before turning to look at his hands.

She stares at him for a few seconds, trying to pinpoint what is different about him. His shoulders sag in a way they never did before, and his skin isn't quite as dark as it had been in the Seam. It's more than physical, though, because even the light in his eyes isn't the same. He looks back up at her after another few minutes of the awkward stillness.

"Why are you here, really?" He finally forces out, and she curses herself because this is Gale. She might've not seen him in ten years, but he still knows her better than anyone else, even Peeta most days.

Katniss hates words. She hates what they can do to people. She's never known how to use them without hurting someone. She says things without thinking, but she forces herself to think about her response. He's patient, eyes fixated on a point behind her.

"I... Peeta wants to have children." The words fall out so quickly, full of desperation and fear. "And I can't, Gale, I _can't_." She whispers, the tears from before creeping back into her voice.

He sighs- a familiar sigh that she knows too well. The sound he'd made so many times before: when he missed an animal in the forest, when he had fought with her over the bombs, when she had asked if it was his device that killed her sister. _Loss_. That's what the sigh means to her. She flinches away from the sound.

"Why can't you?" His words are quiet and muffled a little, but she stares up at him with gratitude that he hasn't thrown her from his home. "The Games are over. The rebellion has been over for a long time. What are you so scared of?"

This is why she needs Gale; forcing her to face the real issue, while so many others tiptoe around her like fragile glass. Gale's the only one who never thought she was fragile. She needs Peeta for his calmness and serenity, but she's always needed Gale for his blunt honesty, too.

Her hands twist into knots as she tries to figure out how to string the words together to answer him. She pulls on her own fingers until they hurt – a trick she learned to help cope with her own flashbacks – but he reaches over and lays a heavy hand on top of hers. A warmth pools in her stomach- it's different than Peeta's warmth, it feels more like the comfort of a familiar song.

"When I picture them, all I see is Prim." She pushes out. "How can I ever tell them what happened to me?" She asks quickly, her gaze trained on the floor, "How do I explain why they have no family?" Her eyes feel heavy, still pushing back the tears. "How do we explain why their father sometimes looks at me with so much hatred and probably always will?" She doesn't even try not to cry anymore, at last getting her questions out into the open.

Suddenly it's like they're teenagers again- before the Games, before everything. Just Gale and Katniss, sitting in the woods, one of his arms gently laying across her shoulder. She knows he isn't Peeta and he never will be, but Peeta is her lover and her best friend and basically all she has. Gale offers something else to her – their shared history of friendship before feelings and war came and ripped it apart.

"You're stronger than you think you are, Katniss." He breathes once she's calmed down, and she hears the same voice from when she was sixteen and had been sentenced to death. "You always have been. You just let fear force you to shut down."

She knows there's an underlying message to his words - how she shut down whenever he tried to talk about feelings when they were younger. Maybe they could have worked. It was too late for that now and so he doesn't push it any further.

"You deserve happiness, Catnip. Let him give you happiness." She knows that she's a horrible person for coming here. For making him reopen old wounds.

She lifts her gaze to his face and makes a spontaneous decision to press her lips very gently to his. A ghost of what could have been. He understands, though, like always, and pushes gently back before pulling away.

They stand together, knowing it's time for her to leave. She cups his cheek softly, giving him the closest thing to a smile she can manage.

"Goodbye, Catnip." He says quietly, and it sounds too final. Too much like a lasting goodbye.

She wishes she could embrace him, tell him that it's going to be okay and that she's never going to forget him. She wishes she could see him smile a real smile for one last time, but mostly she wishes she could tell him that she does love him.

Instead she let's his face go, "Goodbye, Gale." All the unspoken words hang around them as she makes her way down the path.

She turns back quickly, "Gale!" She calls just as he turns to close the door, and his face whips around in curiosity.

"You deserve happiness, too." He smiles at her, and it's the smile she associates with the good days before her life changed forever.

He retreats into his home but she knows that he understands what she's saying. _I forgive you. I love you. Go be happy_.

–

Peeta's waiting up at their kitchen table when she stumbles through the door, so drained both emotionally and physically she can barely stand. She hasn't slept properly in two days and she falls into his arms, taking that warm scent always lingering on his skin.

"I missed you." He breathes into her hair, pulling her in closer, kissing her temple. She smiles into his shoulder.

She pulls back after a few seconds and strokes his handsome face, still young as ever. She pictures their child again, still seeing the blond hair and blue eyes, but instead of Prim she sees Peeta. Peeta's kind smile, his gentle baking hands, his messy hair.

"I missed you, too." She says softly, leaning in to kiss him before picking up her bag and heading upstairs to sort her things.

She decides to wait until his birthday a few weeks later to tell him that she's pregnant and when she does he cries. When their daughter is born, with bright eyes and light hair, her panic dissolves and she finally understands what Gale meant.

She's happy.


End file.
